Religious persecution: almost 15% of Yazidis have fled Iraq

Persecuted Sect in Iraq Avoids Its Shrine

By ALISSA J. RUBIN
Published: October 14, 2007

SHEKHAN, Iraq, Oct. 13 — As the rest of Iraq celebrated the holiday of Id al-Fitr, which ends the holy month of Ramadan, the shrine where Iraq’s persecuted Yazidi minority celebrates a similar holiday, the Jema feast, was nearly empty.

This year was a deadly one in Iraq for Yazidis, who suffered a devastating suicide bomb in August. Iraqi officials estimated that the blast killed close to 500. But even before that, there had been reports of assassinations and kidnappings. The sect is under pressure by both Arab and Kurdish Muslims who want them to convert to Islam.

However, the Islamic State of Iraq, a radical Sunni Arab group, has taken the most violent stand. Its leaders issued a fatwa, or religious ruling, that Yazidis should be killed wherever found. For more than a year, Yazidis have fled from their villages and neighborhoods in Mosul, in Tal Afar, along the Syrian border and in Kurdistan.

At least 70,000 Yazidis have fled the country, said Khairi Shankaly, the director of Yazidi affairs for the Kurdistan Regional Government. That is almost 15 percent of the Yazidi population of 500,000.

more